|
TEN THESES ABOUT PHILOSOPHY OF
MIND AND THEORY OF EXPERIENCE Beppe Pavoletti (Acqui Terme - Italy) December 1st, 1996 |
The essay
argues in favour of the reality of phenomenological consciousness, not to be
conceived as an inner theatre, but rather as a being-in-the world. Observations
about ontology, reductionism, role of language.
1. PHENOMAL CONSCIOUSNESS DOES EXIST (so eliminativism is false)
2. NATURE OF CONSCIOUSNESS ENTAILS THE FACT THAT
IT IS ONTOLOGICALLY SUBJECTIVE
3. FROM THE REALITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS FOLLOWS
THAT WORLD DOES EXIST AT LEAST AS AN APPEARANCE
5. CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF ARE NOT OBJECTIFIABLE
AND CONSCIOUS STATES ARE NOT THINGS OR OBJECTS
9. CONSCIOUSNESS IS NOT SEPARATE FROM THE WORLD
10. EMPIRICAL WORLD AND CONSCIOUS STATES CAN'T BE
IMMEDIATELY CONFLATED
Following theses deal with several controversial
points of today's debate about consciousness, although they in several forms
have been object of investigation in the past history of philosophy.
For the sake of clarity, I have exposed my thoughts in form of theses about philosophy of mind and theory of experience. My thoughts were influenced, among others, by Searle for the issue about subjectivity and by DeWitt for the distinction between the metaphysical and the semantic issue about realism. Furthermore I was influenced by Berkeley and by Schopenhauer as to the theory if experience and the subject-object relation, by Heidegger for the "being in the world", by Descartes and by Dennett for his criticism to the "Cartesian theatre" (although my theses are about opposite to most Dennett’s theories), by Kant and others. Also the recent book "The conscious mind" by David J. Chalmers contains many interesting insights. Furthermore, for some important observations, I'm in debt with my friend Mark Adkins (Arizona State University).
My theses
are just a starting point, and leave several question to further investigation.
I hope that they can help someone to develop his/her own thoughts, and to
philosophize better than me.
I'll be
glad to get comments about them.
As was
pointed out, among others, by Searle in "The rediscovery of the mind"
and by Chalmers in "The conscious mind" such claim needs no proof: if
one is not conscious there is no way to show him that consciousness exists, and
if one is conscious, consciousness shows itself to him, it's not something to
be searched (Aristotle said that one should be able to see what needs proof and
what doesn't). This thesis should be seen as a commitment to neither idealism
nor realism: such issues need further investigations. In other words,
phenomenal consciousness is matter of direct experience, not a theoretical
concept. It seems that among the features of eliminativism there is taking
phenomenal consciousness as a theoretical concept put forth to explain
behaviour and social interaction; thus, one might argue that if we might
conceive alternative ways to explain such phenomena, we can get rid of
consciousness. This argument in itself is valid: simply, consciousness is not a
theoretical concept ... Of course, another possibility is that eliminativists
are actually zombies, that have no direct experience of consciousness. But at
this point we shouldn't make the mistake to take consciousness as an object of
experience: knowing that consciousness exists is a matter of direct experience,
but object of experience are things we see, hear, smell and so on, not
consciousness itself (more on this in following points). I'm also wondering if
eliminativism is even inconsistent, because it admit the existence of entities
such as persons, object around us and so on: but such entities are in turn
characterized by features that I can't understand but as taken from conscious
experience, that is as having such and such an appearance, such and such a form
and so on. And form, appearance and other similar features are derived from
phenomenology we have access to in conscious experience. However, this shows a
weak point of eliminativism, but I'm not sure it's enough to show that it is
also self-contradictory.
From the
thesis (1) follows an interesting conclusion related to debate about strong AI:
if strong AI wants to reproduce intelligent behaviour or computational
processes that are supposed to happen in the brain (or even that are just
accepted as a reconstruction of human reasoning processes, as an as-if
explanation, no matter how correspondent to real one), such aim might be
successful, but it has as such nothing to do with subjective consciousness: it
simply deals with something else so far as I know this idea doesn’t appear very
often in the literature; for example it is endorsed in one of the few Italian
books about philosophy of mind, "L'enigma della mente" (Mind's
enigma) by Sergio Moravia; the more general thesis that describing and
explaining neurophysiological or computational processes is not describing and
explaining phenomenal consciousness is largely dealt with in Chalmers' work;
one could conceive the purpose of strong AI as reproducing subjective
consciousness by means of artifacts, but this looks more as a (very
interesting) technical than as a philosophical problem: however my theses
doesn't entail any commitment to that. But about the last point it is important
to note that here I mean reproduce subjective consciousness as I described it
in thesis (1) and in following ones, that is with its subjectivity, that is not
the same as saying that subjective consciousness is what is reproduced by
strong AI.
One might
wonder what is the place of consciousness within a scientific world's view. The
first thing I've to say here, is that I see no reason to commit to the thesis
that today's science provides an absolute, definitive world's view. Rather, I
think that there are several ways of investigating the world, and that science
itself is subject to transformations, so that we can't reliably foresee which
science we'll have, say, in the year 2150. However, it is clear that today's
physics and biology have not theories adequate to cope with consciousness. At
this point we have two choices: 1. admit that there is something falling
outside of the scope of science 2. admit that we need more wide and powerful
scientific theories in order to cope with consciousness
I think
that these two choices are ultimately the same thing: they simply means that we
need other theories than ones of today's science. Had we such theories, we
could say that science has grown enough, with new theories, to embrace a domain
wider than before, or that a new discipline has been developed outside the
field of science. Such distinction (as the one between science and metaphysics)
are not meaningless and not useless, but should be taken with care because
beyond a certain point they tend to become mere labels. After all, ancient
philosophers didn’t care very much about such differences because what they
really care about was understanding the world.
This
thesis doesn't means that reality of consciousness is subjective in being a
mere opinion, but that subjectivity is its own way of being, as real as the
objective way of being of physical objects (if they exist outside of
consciousness). Hence follows that we need a non-reductionist ontology, that be
able to cope with several way of being and with their mutual relations. I think
that Thomas Nagel, in "A view from nowhere", has clearly pointed out
such need, and maybe Chalmers in "The conscious mind" has pointed out
it even better: in the world there is something beside physical events and
processes. In the history of philosophy such non-reductionist ontologies have
already been attempted: for example, Aristotle's thesis of "analogia
entis"; this an example of a pluralistic ontology. Other ontologies are
non-reductionist in the sense that they don't conflate reality with material
reality: think for example to idealistic metaphysics. It is also worth noting
that an idealist as Hegel didn't think that physical objects are immediately to
be taken as mental, but that the Idea has several ways of being and of
manifesting itself. And we might also think to Spinoza and many others.
Generally speaking, I think that strong dualism and idealism may have their own
flaws, but are nevertheless more plausible than eliminativism.
Note that
at this point I'm committed with neither metaphysical realism nor with
metaphysical idealism, so I don't mean "appearance" as the opposite
of "reality", but only as "what appears, what is manifest"
(phenomenon). Thus the world is not lost, nor turned into a mere social and
linguistic product (society and language are nothing but a part of the world,
with no privileged position): it exists, tough it might turn out that it's not
just appearance, but "mere appearance", as claim phenomenalists.
Debate about realism as existence of knowledge-independent beings, and about
correspondence truth has almost nothing to do with this thesis: in fact what is
claimed here is the existence of the appearance. This thesis is compatible with
the claim that world exists as a mere appearance. The claim that world exist in
some other way which transcends appearance is not the only alternative: one
could argue that appearance are appearing things, appearing beings, without put
things and beings absolutely beyond appearance. At this point, one might be
tempted to think that we are here dealing with sense data, but I don't think:
the expression "sense data" is far from clear, but it seems that it
is mostly intended as referring to raw feelings, pure experience without no
conceptualization, no self-awareness, maybe no self at all. I agree that such
sense data are a kind of myth, unless we take them non as a reality, but just
as a concept useful to analyze our experience (ens rationis cum fundamento in
re). All the same, we must admit that something is given, that there is a
direct access to the being, that entities we have primary access to are not
epistemic and semantic ones (say concepts, statements, beliefs, interpretation,
utterances and so on). This means that we must admit that the so called myth of
the given is non just a myth, provided that we speak of the given in the
context of a theory of a consciousness like the one I'm trying to put forth,
and not a pure, abstract given (calling something a myth is not an argument,
but I suspect that there are more reasons to speak of the myth of the language
than of the myth of the given)
The most
dangerous mistake one can make at this point is to think that consciousness is
a sort of inner eye that allows us to know our thoughts, pains and so on, in
the sense that all these states would be the object of such eye. But such an
eye would be simply a duplication of the real consciousness: instead of saying
that I am seeing a thing, I say that my mind is seeing the image or the
representation of a thing. But to explain that I need in turn another mind in
the mind that see the image of the image, and so on. This is the well known
argument of Dennett against what it calls "Cartesian theatre"; this
arguments appears in several Dennett’s works, such as "Consciousness
Explained". I agree with it, but not with most of other Dennett’s
theories. BTW, I found the argument not only in Dennett, but in "Cognition
and reality" by Ulrich Neisser, published in 1976; similar claims can be
found in some works of the Thomists, and Schopenhauer, from an idealist point
of view, follows the same path in saying that object and subject are mutually
relative. Other interesting observations about the matter are to be found in
the note 34 to the last chapter of Putnam's "Pragmatism: an open
question" (that note sounds strangely realist, and the whole work looks as
intended to criticize more relativism than realism). Thus, saying that statements
about objective reality are inferences from our mental states looks as obvious
only from the point of view of the inner eye: in fact, someone (typically a
direct realist) could argue that as there is no inner eye what we perceive are
not our perceptions, but real things. It goes without saying that the
expression "Cartesian theatre" is assumed as a manner of speaking,
but I'm far from sure that the very core of Descartes' thought has been such
and implausible view; rather I suspect that if he live today, he would agree
with views endorsed by Searle, Chalmers and myself.
This
thesis follows immediately from (4) and (2). Of course, I'm not saying that
mental states don't exist, but only that they don't exist as things or as
objects. I FEEL a pain, but I HAVE a chair. This is maybe the very interesting
thing we can learn from the so called private language argument: according to
one of possible interpretations the deepest Wittgenstein's insight was not a
behaviourist one, and not even a language-related one, but was that of the
subjectivity of the mental. However, I tend always to say in the PLA a
behaviourist and eliminativist position. But here it is most important to point
out that consciousness and conscious states are not the object of experience:
they are rather to be seen as a transcendental level, consciousness being the
horizon that makes possible experiencing something as an object. The fact that
consciousness is a matter of experience without being itself object of
experience has also been very properly called transparency of consciousness,
and is quite a puzzling feature
Characters
of consciousness are both variety and non-discreteness, as follows from (5). In
many of today's philosophy of mind we read only of beliefs, desires and
simplest non-propositional states, such as headache. But non-propositional
states are far more complex and interesting: indeed, they are maybe the most
interesting aspect of consciousness, or at least among the ones that make life
more interesting: let's think to sensations, perception, feelings, mood (very
well dealt with in Searle's "The rediscovery of the mind"), and to
more complex states, such as being in love (it's a pity that love has received
so few consideration from philosophical analysis). But let's go somewhat deeper
in analyzing the structure of conscious experience. I think that we can
recognize three levels: * small scale structure * large scale structure *
metastructures The small scale structure is experience seen at the level of
such elementary entities as sounds, colours and so on: seeing red here and now,
for example. The large scale structure is the experience of the world: the red
I'm seeing here and now is actually a red car that is in a certain place that I
can locate in space and time as a part of a world extended beyond experience
I've here and now access to. The metastructures are higher level elements
revealed by means of the seeing-as: for example see a certain material object,
which such and such dimensions, as a gothic cathedral, a set of sounds as a musical
composition (and, even more, as a symphony of Beethoven rather than as an opera
of Verdi) and so on. It goes without saying that the three structures are not
three entities assembled together to constitute experience.
What is
real is also possible: thus, consciousness that is real for me is not in
principle impossible for other beings similar to me, and not even for
dissimilar ones. It is a matter of the fact whether such beings are actually
conscious: it has nothing to do with features of the language we use to speak
about mental states (the starting point is the beetle in my own box, not the
supposed ones in the boxes of other people: if in my box there is a such and
such thing, it could be present also in other ones). In a similar way we deal
with the identification of experiences: no doubt that one can be wrong in
classifying his own experiences; for examples, he can believe he has already
seen something he sees for the first time. Again, it is a matter of fact
whether he's right or wrong. Experience and life are somewhat puzzling,
confusing and dramatic, but we can't escape from such features by taking refuge
in the regularity of grammar.
Language
is a particular event and activity within the experience, it is not and
absolute starting point, and even less a substitute for the world, as some
extremely language-oriented philosophers seem to think. Of course, I'm not
denying in any way that the study of language is a very important and
interesting one. BTW, I'm not sure that the very distinctive feature of
analytic philosophy is the exclusive orientation towards language: such
orientation has been criticized by some philosophers that are more or less
growth within the analytic tradition, such as DeWitt, Hawking and others, for
example Michele Marsonet, an Italian philosopher who has worked very much in
USA (and one can cite other philosophers that surely are not German
metaphysicians, for example Russell, Ayer and Mundle). Maybe analytic
philosophy is more a style than a content. But this is not the most important
point. What is important, is the claim that language is not independent from
mind and consciousness, although mind-language relations are not simple to deal
with. But we can try to go deeper into this issue, for example to explain
meaning. I tend to think that meaning might be conceived as a transactional
process involving linguistic symbols such as sound and signs and conscious
language user: in this perspective, meaning is not a separate entity whose
relation to concrete, material utterances e should discover, but rather is a process
within the category of the seeing-as, a metastructure (see thesis 6). Thus
meaning is not a thing, but rather the process of seeing something as
meaningful, according to certain physical features and to other elements such
as interpreter expectation, social praxis and so on (I'm not giving here a full
theory of language). It is worth noting that in such perspective the
interpreter is not the creator of the meaning, because meaning exists primarily
from the point of view of the speaker. This conception is speaker-centered, as
opposed to interpreter- centered theories, like the one of Davidson, where the
speaker becomes a mere sounds/signs producing device, and about the whole job
is carried out by the interpreter. I think that with such theories there is
behaviourism lurking in the background, because their conception of the speaker
seems quite behaviourist (it is unclear, for me at least, whether the
interpreter should be in turn seen in a similar behaviourist view.
World is
not a show being played on the stage of my own consciousness: indeed,
consciousness is consciousness of being in the world (remember Heidegger's
in-der-Welt-sein). I'm conscious as a part of a world. Kant's warnings about
the need of holding at the same time the empirical realism and the
transcendental idealism means that I am an empirical being just as things in
the world around me, so such things are not simply representation of mine as a
particular empirical being. Nevertheless, the whole point is puzzling; for
example, it is worth noting that world appears as my experience and at the same
time I experience my existence as existence as a part of the world.
This
thesis follows from (4), (5) and (9), and means that the fact that I'm
conscious of a car doesn't entail that car is nothing but a conscious state.
Notice the "immediately": this thesis holds for the phenomenalist
just as for the realist. It means that there is a distinction between the
empirical world (the so called 'external world') and one's mental events, no
matter how we interpret the external world (mere appearance or thing in
itself). Thus "tree" refers to trees in the empirical world, and "my
thought of trees" refers to my thoughts of trees, that are quite other
things; even if both trees and thoughts were mere appearances, they would be
structurally different ones. In sum, at a certain level - that of everyday
life, social life and even science (maybe within certain limits) - we can act
as empirical realist, even if we are transcendental idealist, that is we can
deal with world as if it was an external, objective one, even if it were not.
The place of realism and idealism is at an higher level of abstraction.